


seven minutes in purgatory

by souldews



Category: Persona 4
Genre: M/M, Seven Minutes In Heaven
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-22
Updated: 2014-04-22
Packaged: 2018-01-20 10:57:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1508006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/souldews/pseuds/souldews
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>purgatory: a space that is neither Heaven nor Hell; exists in the middle of it.</p><p>also a space that describes exactly how being in that room for seven minutes with one Narukami Yu felt for Hanamura Yosuke.</p><p>--</p><p>tumblr prompt. Yosuke and Yu (are somehow forced to) play seven minutes in heaven; although how they spent the seven minutes in heaven was certainly...not commonly how one would do seven minutes in heaven, which may or may not include rounds of scissors-paper-stone. Or something. After all, the flow of time is somewhat skewed when you're not allowed to take any time-telling object with you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	seven minutes in purgatory

**Author's Note:**

> So a few days ago I asked for souyo prompts in the souyo tag on my main blog [togekisus](http://togekisus.tumblr.com) and this is one of them:
> 
>  
> 
> Anon, I really hope it's to your liking.
> 
> Set somewhere in game, during summer holidays. Sometime after the festival, they stayed in the Amagi inn again.

_No. Way._

Yosuke stares, and stares some more; by now, if he stares hard enough, he's positive he can bore a hole into the glass of the bottle through the sheer force of his look alone. Or maybe with a dash of willpower to get out of here, at least.

Because there is  _no way_ he is going into a closet with  _Yu._

The person Yosuke is currently worried about is no less surprised, but Yu doesn't let it show much more than the way his eyes widen just a fraction. He doesn't do anything to quiet the whooping of everyone else present when the bottle skids to a halt in front of Yosuke, either. From the way Yu himself is staring at the bottle, quiet, pensive, Yosuke's sure that they both can make the bottle spontaneously combust and maybe he won't have to do this after all, right, if he stares a little harder.

On the other hand, Teddie and Chie are suspiciously very, very excited. Naoto snickers quietly into her palm, trying and failing to cover the sound with a cough. Yukiko offers an encouraging smile; to whom, neither boy are sure. Probably both of them.

"Come ooon." Chie drawled, bordering on an outright whine. "Rules are rules, get in there, seven minutes, give me your watches and phones and whatnots, go!"

"But I'm not--"  _\--going in there with Yu_ , Yosuke wanted to say, only to have Teddie take both Yosuke and Yu's phones away from them. _  
_

"Saying no is beary bad! Rules are rules, isn't that how games work?"

_God damn it, Teddie._

Amidst the clamor Yu finally speaks. "There's no use dawdling, is there? Let's just do it. We don't have to do anything in there." 

(To which a shout of "No fun!" which surely belonged to Chie was heard.)

\--

"So." Yosuke begins, after they were both sat down in one of the emptier rooms in the Amagi inn. 

"So." Yu nods in agreement, fingers picking at the hem of his shirt.

"...Seven minutes huh, partner?" He mumbles, stare darting everywhere and refusing to land on Yu.

"Seven minutes." Yu echoes, and lets silence reign over them once more. For the longest time, nothing happens, and why is seven minutes not passing yet because the last time Yosuke checked, seven minutes is not that long of a time, and why is this game seven minutes in heaven, because this does  _not_ feel like heaven in any way, and--

"You're rambling."

\--was he saying all that  _out loud_? Oh.  _Oh._

"Um." Yosuke replied intelligently.  _Great._

"If it's not that great, we can always try and make it better. Like play scissors-papers-stone for seven minutes."

Trust Yu to ease the situation and make him feel better about himself; this is exactly what Yosuke likes about him. One of the many reasons, in fact.

"There really isn't much else you can do, is there?" Yosuke offers, laughing and scratching the back of his neck. Yu chuckles lightly, and outstretches his hand.

"Let's play, then."

"Eh, you were serious!?"

"Who said I wasn't?"

\--

Countless games later (they'd both stopped keeping track of who won or who lost), Yosuke threw his head back and laughed.

"I can't believe we're doing this for seven minutes."

And never in their wildest dreams would anyone else know that they've been playing scissors-paper-stone, either. 

"Still think it's bad?" Yu replies, slightly breathless with laughter, the smallest of smiles gracing his face.

"No." Yosuke grins, still breathless. He tilts his face forward again and  _oh._

Their eyes meet.

For that brief moment, Yosuke takes in the slightly flushed features of Yu's face-- must have been from both heat and laughter, the quirk of his lips upward just so, the way the corners of Yu's eyes crinkle and he can't help it, can't help the way his own lips mirror Yu's smile, can't help averting his eyes slightly away.

Can't help the way his heartbeat speeds up and kind of stutters in that funny way when you've got a crush a mile wide on someone and they're in front of you.

For a moment, no one says anything, and Yosuke thinks he might just lean in and close the distance between them, because wouldn't that be easy, and Yu wouldn't mind, would he--

"Thirty seconds left!"

And just like that, the spell over them breaks, along with their eye contact as Yu coughs into his palm and Yosuke suddenly finding the wall decoration very, very interesting.

"That-- that wasn't bad." he murmurs, cheeks pink, and he hopes it can pass for the result of the summer heat.

"No, it wasn't." Yu agrees, and they're back to echoing each other's statements again.

This time, Yosuke doesn't mind it as much.

"Thanks, partner."

Yu only offers another smile in return as a knock sounds on the sliding doors with a "Time's up!" accompanying it.

\--

Later that night, Naoto finds Yosuke on the balcony near the bathing areas.

"You didn't kiss him." Naoto starts, blunt and to the point.

"No." Yosuke shakes his head and smiles. He doesn't even bother to ask her how she knows; that's just the way she is. Observant, picks up on details no-one else does. He's given up on the "how" long ago, and learns to simply accept it.

"You could have; he's not going to stay in Inaba forever." Naoto states, as if it was fact; as if she was concluding a case.

"Maybe." Yosuke murmurs. Both of them know he's evading the statement, but Naoto wisely doesn't choose to press.

 _Maybe next time,_ he thinks to himself.

A time where they aren't limited to merely four hundred and twenty seconds, but during a moment where time will stop for them, a moment where there are no spectators, a moment where he's less jittery and more sure about it all.

A time where he can simply take it easy and not feel like the natural rhythm of his heartbeat's been thrown off.

(Although, Yosuke doubts that there'd ever be a time where it doesn't. 

He doubts there'd ever be when it comes to Narukami Yu.)

**Author's Note:**

> author's note:
> 
> they do find that time to do the kisus, post-game, near the riverbank, and it's great. yeah.
> 
> to the anon, thank you for reading and sending me the prompt! i hope to work on the other one because that one was certainly...unique.
> 
> kudos and a little comment (maybe) if you liked it? c:


End file.
